An Open Letter to Virginia State Senators and Delegates:

Last Friday evening I went to see the movie “Lincoln.”  In that film the portrayal of “politics as usual” in the service of a higher end,  the passage of the 13th Amendment freeing the slaves, is every bit as relevant today as it has been at least since the early Greek experiments in democracy.

Throughout the history of our great nation, politicians every so often harness “politics as usual” to do something meaningful or more often to stop harmful measures that undermine our freedom and democracy.

Now before the General Assembly are two measures, SB 1256 requiring photo identification for voters despite the absence of fraud in our elections and SB 1077 requiring a check of immigration status.  The generally unstated motivation behind this legislation is the desire by some to limit the voting franchise most likely impacting the elderly, particularly those who have surrendered their drivers’ licenses, students , the poor and naturalized citizens.

That some would see advantage in suppressing the vote is not uncommon.  Politicians at all levels of government and of all parties would rather see their supporters turn out rather than their opponents’.  In Virginia, voter suppression was refined to a crass art by Democrat Harry F. Byrd, Sr. whose virulent racism is a sad chapter in our state’s history.

However, since the beginning of our nation, the ‘arc of history has bent toward justice’ with the extension of voting rights, first to male slaves by President Lincoln with the passage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution and then to women with the passage of the 19th Amendment.   The passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 finally put the enforcement powers of the federal government behind the rights of African-Americans to vote bringing with it the decline of the Byrd organization and the election of a Republican Governor, Linwood Holdon, Jr.

Today, virtually all Americans embrace these extensions of the voting franchise as essential steps in the evolution of our modern democracy.  So why then is the Party of Lincoln today seemingly intent on eroding citizens’ rights with unnecessary restrictions on voting?

In the next week Republicans in the Virginia House and Senate must decide whether politics  will be put in service to a higher end with the defeat SB 1256 and SB 1077, or whether “politics as usual” will just be” politics as usual”.  Before Virginia’s Senators and Delegates vote they would all benefit from watching the film “Lincoln”.

Glen Besa, Director

Sierra Club-Virginia Chapter

According to Sen. Mark Herring, “just as the 2012 General Assembly session became know for the ‘war on women,’ the 2013 General Assembly session could easily be known as the ‘war on voters.'” So true. Sen. Herring adds that the long lines at polls this past November were “unacceptable,” yet Republicans’ response was to submit legislation to “make it harder and harder for people who disagree with them to vote.” Instead, Sen. Herring argues, we need to be making it as easy as possible for Virginians to exercise their right to vote. Thanks to Sen. Herring for standing up against the Republicans’ blatant, anti-democratic (small “d”) efforts. I look forward to next January, when Attorney General Herring can stand up for all Virginians.

According to the increasingly “moderate”-sounding Bill Bolling (although his record is conservative through and through), we need new revenues for transportation (duh!). How do we get those revenues? According to Bolling, “it seems to me the easiest way to do that is to address the fact that the gas tax hasn’t been increased since 1986…the regional average is about 27 cents a gallon, we’re at about 17 cents a gallon, so we could easily go to 23 or 24 cents a gallon and still be well below the regional average” (also duh!). Seriously, this is the no-brainer of all no brainers: Virginia needs billions of dollars, probably tens of billions of dollars, for transportation, and the only serious way to do that is to raise the gas tax. In addition, it’s a no-brainer for environmental and national security reasons, as we  want to be moving away from fossil fuels as rapidly as possible. In fact, if we fully internalized all the pollution, health, national security, and other costs of oil, we’d have gasoline at $10 per gallon or higher, so all this sturm und drang about a few cents is really just silly, as nobody has a serious alternative (and no, raising the sales tax is NOT a serious alternative).

More broadly, Bolling says that all the Republican LG candidates running around saying they oppose any taxes to raise money for transportation are being completely unrealistic. Either that, or they’re just good at political pandering. But the fact is, as Bolling points out, “policy is set in the real world, not in some ideological world,” and “none of those people [the GOP LG candidates] will solve this problem – none of them.” Are you listening, Pete Snyder et al? Key word: “compromise,” which sadly is a curse word to the Teapublican’ts.

On Medicaid expansion, Bolling says he’s come “full circle,” and that the “business case has been made for Medicaid expansion...if we’re able to negotiate the flexibility from the federal government to initiate a number of reforms in the way we operate our Medicaid program to make it more efficient, and more effective, and more affordable.” Again, where are the 2013 Republican candidates on this issue, of paramount importance to hundreds of thousands of Virginians, and to the state as a whole? Nowhere, as far as I can tell.

Finally, with regard to his possible gubernatorial run, Bolling says he’s still 50/50, is convinced he’d be a “credible independent candidate,” and that the main question is whether he can raise enough money to run a winning campaign. Stay tuned for March 14, when Bolling says he’ll announce his decision.

P.S. I’d point out that Virginia’s 17-cents-per-gallon gas tax accounts for only 4% of the price, meaning the remaining 96% goes to the oil companies, the refiners, the gas stations, the federal government, OPEC, etc. In contrast, in most other advanced, industrialized Western nations, taxes make up 70%, 80% of the price. Why is our energy policy so different in the US than in the rest of the developed world? Basically, because oil interests have us by the balls. We need to not-so-gently remove their hands from our cojones, ASAP.

by Paul Goldman

Governor McDonnell can’t understand why those Republicans who want his job aren’t focusing on the number 100%. Okay, that’s really a ratio, based on two rounded-off numbers: $3.60 as the numerator and $1.80 as the denominator. $1.80 and $3.60. But to be more precise, the Governor’s view of the Bolling vs Cuccinelli vs McAuliffe three-ring circus is being shaped by four data points: $1,400, 800, $2.20, $1,100.

At this time in Governor Warner’s last year, the average price of a gallon of gas at the pump rang the register at around $1.85. Today, according to national statistics, it is currently about $3.60. That’s a nearly 100% increase. You got it: The average swing voter knows he or she is paying a $1.75 a gallon MORE for gasoline.

According to national statistics, after you do what political strategy folks are suppose to do, it turns out the far more potent political statistic is $1,400 MORE. Why? If you shift through the various studies, it seems fair to conclude the average swing voter in a Virginia election – a middle aged worker with a used car who has to sit in traffic at times to get to work and when trying to have some fun – uses about 800 gallons of refined black gold a year. When you multiply $1.75 X 800, you get how much a year the average swing voter is paying for gasoline at the pump. It therefore costs $1,400 a year more to fill the tank of the average swing voter.

However: I concede this not very sophisticated of me, just my high school and junior college education talking. Truth is though, I never ran into a swing voter who asked me about nominal vs. inflation adjusted energy prices. Sorry therefore to spend so much time on Main Street. On the blogs, editorial boards, opinion columns, graduate school seminars, it’s different: they use the real inflation adjusted numbers, got to show something for all the money spent on graduate school.

OKAY: You got me. Forgive an old dog his trespasses. I should use inflation adjusted dollars, how unsophisticated can a guy be right? So I went to the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics website. They have a calculator to help us retro types understand 2013 political analysis. It produces an inflation-adjusted price of a gallon of gas at the start of this year at roughly $2.20. This means, in real terms, $1,000 is a fair estimate of the expected extra annual cost in constant dollars for a swing voter to fuel up his or her vehicle this year.

But of course, the real PhD in campaigning realizes the truly powerful number, is this one: What percentage of previously disposal income is now gone down the gas tank for the average swing voter?  So let me sum it up in grade school political language: The average swing voter is hopping, jumping, freaking, kick the gas pump mad when filling up the tank. They ain’t thinking constant dollars, or any of the policy wonk psycho babble. If they have a 15-gallon gas tank, they have to pay an extra near 30 bucks to fill up. If they have a 20 gallon tank, they have to pay nearly $35 more at today’s prices. The price of gas could be $4.00 per gallon at election time.  

So McDonnell is thinking: Why would anyone who has ever run a winning statewide campaign in Virginia, or played any major role in developing the strategy, believe 2013 is the election year to go to the voters with the proud boost that you did them a favor by forcing them to pay a RECORD GAS TAX INCREASE on top of the $1,400, on top of the new tolls in Tidewater, need I go on?

The answer: No one would. No one could with any political sense. Thus, when Bill Bolling jumped ship on the governor and went from supporting the total elimination of the gas tax to supporting a RECORD GAS TAX INCREASE, Mr. McDonnell decided his LG had lost his political mind, seduced by the editorial writers and others calling him the “moderate” hope of the GOP. The governor never figured Bolling would be so easily manipulated. He was wrong.

He knows Cuccinelli is a hard case. Thus McDonnell always figured McAuliffe would be the first to back his idea of shutting down the gas tax and moving toward a sales tax for transportation, an idea he actually took from the Democrats in the first place! But the governor soon realized this might be too tricky until Senator Saslaw had at least had a chance to negotiate. Terry is a loyal guy.  

Leaving then, as the governor saw it: A lay-up for Cuccinelli. The Governor waited and waited. But Cuccinelli refused.

Then the AG shocked the governor by backing the GOP Senate plan. It was DOA once people realized it had no political, must less transportation, appeal. It raised less money, yet was called a tax increase by GOP anti-taxers, kept a user fee on gas, and hiked the sales tax de facto on internet sales. It offended everyone.

So now the ball sits next to the basket, a lay-up for the first candidate for governor who picks it up and declares: I WILL NOT SUPPORT A RECORD GAS TAX INCREASE. It is the only surefire winner right now.

There is no chance that Governor McDonnell is going to support a RECORD GAS TAX INCREASE if it manages to get out of the House of Delegates.

He can add: all the way up to $1400, $1,100, whatever number who think is the most accurate. Why would any sensible political advisor tell his or her candidate to leave themselves open to the charge of raising the price of gas, meaning you could get blamed for the whole mess?

Based on the governor’s rhetoric, I believe it will be difficult for him to agree to any increase in the gas tax based on his claim it would raise the price of gas.  But the size demanded by the Senate Bill and Mr. Bolling is NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. So I understand why the Governor is baffled by the not-ready-for-prime time campaigns of fellow Republicans Bolling and Cuccinelli.

If McDonnell were running for governor, he would have long ago denounced a RECORD GAS TAX INCREASE  and promised never to back it.